This invention relates generally to water faucet assemblies, and more particularly to an improved injection-molded plastic body for a faucet assembly which is economical to manufacture, pleasing in design and silent in operation.
Faucet assemblies of the type commonly utilized with sinks in kitchens and bathrooms usually include a housing in which hot and cold water control valves are mounted together with metal or plastic piping and fittings for forming a flow path from the hot and cold water valves to an outlet spigot or spout extending from the faucet assembly. The piping, fittings and valves are commonly mounted within the housing, the control stems for the valves extending through the housing for adjustment by a user.
This type of construction, because of the need to separately form and assemble the various components, is unnecessarily costly to manufacture. Attempts at reducing the cost by forming the entire assembly from a single mold have heretofore not been satisfactory primarily because of the difficulty of economically forming interior passageways of sufficient size and strength within the mold while maintaining a smooth exterior surface.
Prior art valve assemblies have also had an unnecessarily high profile, primarily because of the internal passageways, which have had to be circular in cross section to employ standard piping. This has been a significant disadvantage in those applications requiring a faucet assembly having minimum height above the sink for reasons of aesthetics and practicality. Such assemblies have also been undesirably subject to knocking, a phenomenon resulting from changes in hoop stress, or internal pressure, exerted by the water on the walls of the passageways as the valves are closed or partially closed.
Accordingly, it is a general object of the present invention to provide a new and improved faucet assembly.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a new and improved body for a faucet assembly which is more economical to manufacture.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new and improved injection-molded body assembly for a faucet which has a low profile.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an injection-molded body assembly for a faucet which is less subject to knocking with changes in water flow rates.